Chapter Ten Jasalyn

Chapter Ten

Jasalyn

T HE VILLAGE "UP AHEAD" IS nearly another hour's ride, and by the time we stop to meet Remme, exhaustion has me on the brink of tears.

Kendrick swings off the horse first and then turns to help me as if he understands just how much I'm aching. It's probably written all over my face.

This is why everyone thinks I'm so fragile.

When he reaches for me, it's easy to imagine his hands on my hips and the slow slide of my body down his. It's also easy to imagine how weak that would make me look in front of his friends.

I pull my shoulders back. "I know how to dismount a horse, but thank you."

His brows shoot up, but he steps back. "As you wish, Princess."

I dismount and stumble forward a few steps when my legs buckle under me. Kendrick doesn't say a word, just leads the way.

Remme meets us at the door to our lodging, which seems to be a rowdy tavern on the ground floor with rooms on the floors above. "Two rooms," he says, holding up two keys on oversize rings. "Looks like we are living in luxury tonight."

"And who's paying for that?" Skylar asks.

"I have money," I say. "I can contribute." But what I'm really thinking is, Only two rooms? Will they stick me with Skylar for the night or keep me with Kendrick? I'm afraid Skylar and I might claw each other's eyes out before morning, but I'm afraid of staying with Kendrick too. For different reasons.

Reasons that probably never occurred to him.

"Oh?" Skylar says, propping a hand on her hip. "You have money? And where is this money of yours? You have the coin on you?"

"It's... I..." I've never actually had to carry coin since my sister brought me to live with her at the Midnight Palace. I'm sister to the shadow queen, and I can charge anything I want to the palace accounts.

"Trust me, Sky," Remme says, "we couldn't all fit into one of these rooms."

"It's fine." Kendrick snatches a key from Remme's hand. "We can afford it."

Skylar grabs the other key. "I'll bunk with the new girl."

"Literally," Remme says. "They're bunk rooms."

"Seriously?" she asks.

Natan scans the road and the thatched vendor stalls and nods. "My sources tell me that lots of soldiers came through here during the war and the lodgings haven't been converted yet."

"I call top bunk," Remme says.

"Because you're an idiot," Skylar says. She meets my eyes. "You're on top. I need my feet close to the ground."

"Fine," I mutter. I doubt I'll be able to sleep anyway. And if Skylar finds out how I feel about the dark, she'll probably paint the windows black and snuff out all the candles just to amuse herself.

You have your ring. You'll be fine.

Remme, Skylar, and Natan grab their packs and head inside, but Kendrick brushes his knuckles against my shoulder, so I stay back.

He watches them and waits until they're inside before looking at me. "Are you going to be okay?"

"I don't know. What are the chances she'll kill me in my sleep?"

The corner of his mouth twitches. "Believe it or not, she doesn't have it out for you. She's just a little abrasive."

"That's like saying water is a little moist."

This time I get a full-on smile. If my legs were unsteady before, the sight of those dimples makes them downright unreliable.

"Hold up a minute, okay?" He pulls his pack from his shoulder and digs around inside before drawing out a glowstone the size of my palm. "Take this. It will last all night."

I stare at it. It's a faint yellow in the evening sun, but in the dark, it will let off a buttery glow. It's magic from Elora. From home. I swallow a lump of emotion in my throat. "Thank you."

"Tell me again about this special sword," I ask at dinner. The tavern is crowded tonight, and the five of us are crammed into a corner, bowls full of stew and hunks of bread in front of each of us.

Remme's blade sings as he draws it from his sheath. "You see this?" he asks, turning the blade this way and that. "This blade was forged by the hand of the last true king of Elora, blessed by the priestess of the Oracle of Light, and passed down through the generations to fighters deemed noble enough to fight for the good of the land. This is a special sword. The Sword of Fire is the Sword . It can open portals to anywhere, bring strength to anyone who wields it, and guarantee your opponent's defeat."

I glance around the group to see if anyone is laughing, but they're not. "There are so many things wrong with the nonsense you just spouted."

" Nonsense? " Remme sputters.

"Here we go," Natan says.

"Like what?" Remme says.

"The idea of you being deemed noble aside?" I say, "Elora has never had kings, so that sword couldn't have been forged by its first, last, middle, true, or false king. We have the Magical Seven of Elora, and before them we ran as independent villages ruled by our own lords, all more or less unaware of each other."

Skylar scoffs and glances toward Remme. "Sure, and you're the one spewing nonsense."

I press a palm to my chest. "Do you forget that I'm Eloran too?"

"I don't forget," Skylar says. "I just happen to know the history that the Elora Seven work so hard to keep hidden from the people of the realm."

I choke out a laugh. "Oh, so now you're going to tell me that the Magical Seven are the bad guys?"

Kendrick just watches me for a beat before nodding. "Yes," he says. "If you want to know the truth."

I shake my head at him. "The Magical Seven are the purest hearts in the land. They have to walk through the Fire Portal before they rise. Murderers don't survive that."

"It's true," Skylar says. "The Seven like to make a display of their holiness. That's why they save their murdering for after they've taken their spots among the most powerful in the realm."

The idea that the Magical Seven would kill anyone is ridiculous. "They are the only reason the fae didn't take total control of us when the gates opened. They are the only reason our realm was protected from these monsters. "

" Monsters , huh?" Skylar says.

Kendrick's gaze sweeps over me, landing on my arm where my scars are hidden beneath my glamour. "And how well protected were you?"

My skin goes clammy at the reminder—of my past, of the dungeons, of how easy it was for Mordeus to have his goblin sweep in and take me from my home. "That was because of the contracts," I say, my voice weak.

"And if the Seven are so great, why are those unjust contracts so pervasive?" Kendrick asks.

"It's not their fault. The system is broken. The—"

"It wasn't before." Kendrick's eyes are kind, as if he understands that he's asking me to rethink everything I ever believed.

"And who would you have lead?" I ask. "This old monarchy Remme seems to revere?"

"For starters," Kendrick says, tearing off another piece of bread. "I would have someone lead who wants what is truly best for all in the realm and not just the strongest magic users among them. I would have someone lead who would listen to the voices of a representative from every territory in the realm—not just the wealthiest. I would have someone lead," he says, his voice even harder now, "who wasn't so preoccupied by greed that they let children be sold into servitude every day."

I hear what he's saying, and it's not that I disagree, but the Magical Seven keep the portals between Elora and Faerie closed. They're the reason the fae don't just go into Elora and snatch as many humans as they'd like. Just because our realm isn't perfect doesn't mean the leaders are to blame. "It could be worse."

"It could be better. "

Something about his words niggles at me. Because even though this is the first I've heard about the Magical Seven hiding the true history of our realm, my sister has been railing for years against the evil of those contracts and the way Elora works only for the wealthy.

"Is there a washroom?" I ask, pushing away from the table.

Skylar chuckles and points to the other side of the tavern. "End of the hall. Might have to wait your turn. I think I saw an orc going in there."

I ignore her smirk and head that way. It's funny that she thinks I'm so pampered. While I have lived in comfort for my years in the palace, she has no idea what my life was like before that. My sister and I had to work our fingers to the bone to get by. We worked all day, cleaned our aunt's house all night, and for the few brief hours we got to rest, shared a bed in a tiny windowless room in my aunt's basement. Because of the very contracts the Magical Seven allow to go unchecked.

"Are you okay?"

I jump. I hadn't even noticed Kendrick was following me. "Everything I've ever known to be true was a lie—down to my own blood." I shake my head, trying to force my jumble of thoughts into place. My eyes burn. "Now I'm supposed to believe even the Magical Seven, the most powerful mages of the human realm, are behind the very practices that resulted in my sister and me spending our childhood in servitude to a greedy shrew?"

He lifts a hand, and I think he might touch me—think I might want him to—but then he drops it. "Their transition into power was horrendous. For the first couple of generations, people knew the truth, but the Seven destroyed all evidence of the true history of the land and executed anyone who dared speak of it. Two generations later, they'd rewritten history. Everything we're doing here is to change that."

I bow my head. "And this Erith you want me to kill?"

"He's their patriarch. He leads them, and losing his rule would weaken them, but the biggest blow would be that they'd lose their seventh. Their magic—their strength—is tied to that sacred number. That's why I want to do this now, while they have no trained apprentice in the wings. Once he dies, the Seven fall. Only then can we begin to right the wrongs they've done to the realm."

They want me to kill one of the Magical Seven. I guessed as much from the things they said at the table, but hearing him say it makes my stomach sour. "I need to think."

"I understand." He steps back, then looks me over one final time before returning to the table.

When I go to the washroom door, it's slightly ajar, and I hear a soft whimpering from the other side.

I knock and nudge it open. "Hello?" On the far wall, curled up on the floor between the sink and the toilet, is a delicate female with glowing eyes and pointed ears sticking out of her short violet hair. "Are you hurt?"

She spots me and jumps to her feet. "So sorry. I'll get out of your way."

"No, you're fine."

She has a split lip and is holding her arm tenderly against her body.

"What happened?"

"Oh. He's just in a mood." She smiles but it looks too painful to be real. "He'll sleep it off and be better tomorrow."

She looks too young to be married, but it's hard to tell with faeries. Once they hit puberty, they age so slowly. "Your... father?" I guess.

"Husband," she says in a hush. "My father married me off to him when I hit maturity."

"You were sold?" I thought that only happened to humans.

She nods. "It was a fair deal, and my father needed the money."

Sold. Just like when my aunt sold me to Mordeus. What is wrong with these people? "When was that?"

"Two years next month."

My nails bite into my palms at the sight of her injuries. I make myself count my breaths before I speak again. "Do you need me to find you a healer?"

She shakes her head. "No. He'll see. He'll know. And anyway." She swallows hard. "He'll be gone soon. His cronies have finally arrived. It's strange to be so grateful for a movement that you also think is so ugly."

I frown. "What movement?"

Her face goes stony, and she looks me over. "I need to get back to work." She wipes her hands on her pants and her tears on her shoulders. "Thank you for caring. You didn't have to."

I see her again when I return to the others. She's wiping down tables and sweeping behind the bar, getting scolded by a tall, dark-haired fae male I might call attractive if it weren't for the sneer on his face and the way he speaks to his young wife. No, this male is ugly on the inside, and his insides are showing.

Skylar digs her elbow into my side. "Would you quit staring?"

I drop my gaze back to my dinner, but in my periphery I'm aware of the male and the group of a dozen faeries gathered at a long table closer to the bar. They're all dressed in the same uniform of brown pants and olive vest. Many have sideways crescent moons tattooed on their necks. The proprietor keeps circling back to their table and laughing with them.

"What do we know about that group?" I ask quietly. "The loud ones the proprietor seems partial to?"

"Enough to mind our own business," Skylar says, not looking up from her bowl.

Remme chuckles and nods in agreement.

Kendrick flicks his gaze to the group then to Natan.

"I know," Natan says. "I'm on it."

"What does that mean?"

"It means we like to keep an eye on the people around us who could be trouble," Remme says, his voice low, "but we're smart enough not to let them know we're doing it."

The proprietor alternates between scolding his wife behind the bar and returning to the table with the rowdy males, filling their glasses with fresh ale.

"Would you please not stare?" Skylar says, elbowing me again.

"Sorry." I drop my gaze to my stew, but I can't do anything to contain the hate rolling off me. When he bought his wife, she was likely younger than I was when I was sold to Mordeus. She should've been allowed to be a child. Her father should've protected her. The world shouldn't be such an ugly place that things like that happen at all—not to humans or faeries.

My ring feels warm against my breast, where I tucked it into my bustier before dinner. I feel it calling to me.

"You want to steer clear of the likes of them," Remme says. "Trouble, through and through. I might not care about Faerie politics, but even I think this godsforsaken realm is better off with your sister on that throne than it was without her."

"Careful," Kendrick murmurs.

I glare at Remme. "You think ? Of course it's better." I force myself to keep my voice low.

"Not if you ask those folks back there," Skylar says, gesturing with her spoon toward the table of uniformed males.

Kendrick flinches and rubs his temples. "Thanks, Sky."

She shrugs. "It's just facts. I don't see what the problem is."

Remme takes a long pull from his dark glass of ale, then wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. " Problem is all that rage in her eyes," he says, nodding to me.

Skylar chuckles. "You really think she's gonna do something about it? About them ? I'd like to see her try."

Kendrick rubs his forehead. "Please stop."

She winks at him. "I thought you liked it when I brought out the fight in your little girlfriend."

I decide to ignore all three of them and turn to Natan. "Someone told me that group is leaving. Where would they be going?"

Natan looks to Kendrick.

"No," I snap. "Look at me . You don't need his permission. Tell me."

Kendrick's jaw ticks. "Go ahead."

"We don't know where they're headed," Natan says, his tone hushed. He pushes his glasses up his nose. "But I would guess they're traveling around the court to gather recruits. They aren't strong enough yet, but if they keep growing like they have, they'll make a charge to remove your sister from the throne sooner rather than later."

Anger and hatred burn in my blood. I knew there were pockets of Mordeus's followers throughout the court, but I didn't realize any of them planned to act. They are lucky to have my sister. They have no idea how much my family lost so that fate or destiny or Mab or whoever is in charge of this idiocy could get her there. That they not only don't appreciate it but want to take it from her makes me want to tear them apart with my bare hands. I don't even need the ring to feel my chest cooling and my heart frosting over.

"Easy, Slayer," Kendrick says. "We can't save the entire realm today. We have to start by finding the sword."

What he means is we have to start by murdering the leader of the Magical Seven, and I still don't know how I feel about that.

I've eaten only a few bites of my stew, but I can't stomach any more. I push away from the table. "Excuse me. I think I'll retire early."

"You should eat," Kendrick says, worried eyes scanning my face.

I snatch my bread from my plate and nod to him. "I'll see you in the morning."

As I head for the stairs, I hear them murmuring behind me and shortly after, I sense someone following. A glance over my shoulder confirms Remme's a few steps behind. He gives me an apologetic wave, but I'm just glad it's not Skylar. I want a few minutes alone.